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I spend so much time modifying the games I want to play that, by the time I get them to a playable state, I no longer want to play them anymore. It's a frustrating experience. I think I need to just upgrade my computer and kiss off a load of older games (ESPECIALLY Grim Fandango) because I'm really fed up with incompatibilities and limitations of archaic design.

Just needed to vent. Having the ability to install mods is nice and all, but I hate that for some of these games it's an absolute requirement to spend about an hour googling the right mods.

Fallout 3 will probably take you half a day to get it set up right, but damn it's worth it!!!
I'm only just playing this now for the first time, really great.
Maybe I should write up a guide so someone doesn't have spend a ton of research and study to get it going like i had to... because the existing guides assume you understand things that I did not.

Had the same problem with Morrowind... i spent literally DAYS tuning Morrowind to a state where I was happy with it, but curse those danged modders, they keep on updating their mods, meaining I have to reinstalll, praying it doesn't break my save game.

I took a break from it, and am now so reluctant to try and catch up that I might not bother returning to my game.

This was the main culprit, the BTBGI mod was literally updated every week, and was a real pain to reinstall:

Fallout 3 is definitely a pain in that respect. Sadly, I wouldn't WANT to play it without mods. Watching my friend play New Vegas confirmed this for me, as she repeatedly shot the same dude in the face (while being shot at herself) while her NPC companion wailed on him from behind with a sledgehammer.
"OK, I'll distract him by shooting him point blank 10 times with a shotgun, and you sneak up behind him and brain him!"
Fallout Wanderers Edition: absolutely essential to making things a bit less ridiculous.

Well Thief is just a pain to get running on modern systems, and then the default control scheme is a little weird. I've also never played Oblivion modded and I've got New Vegas lined up after Fallout 3

Been there, done that. Ended up just saying "screw it" and playing the game for what it was worth. Morrowind, Oblivion and Fallout 3 are by far the worst offenders. Doom's myriad of PWADs though are more about new gameplay experiences, not fixing fundamental flaws, I have all the time in the world for that kind of stuff. Especially when people make things like Action Doom. Of all the games out there, I'd say Doom has to rank as one of the top 10 for modifications.

Doom's myriad of PWADs though are more about new gameplay experiences, not fixing fundamental flaws, I have all the time in the world for that kind of stuff.

Pretty much the only time I would use a mod on a base game (as opposed to a full-fledged mod like Dear Esther or The Stanley Parable) is to fix something about usability, playability, cosmetics, or fun-factor that really irks me. Or, put another way, I dislike new weapons, monsters, maps, etc. Here's what I've got running so far:

Deus Ex - HDTP, New Vision, Shifter, an OpenGL renderer
Doom/Doom 2/Final/Heretic/Hexen - Just Skulltag to fix my headaches with the controls (does anyone know how to get Wolfenstein 3D to use a "standard" KB+Mouse setup? I tried Wolf4SDL but I don't really know how it works)
Morrowind - I have Morrowind 2011 (from before it got pulled) but I suspect that there's something newer and better I should be using... I haven't even played the damn thing.
Oblivion - I did EVERYTHING in Oblivion in vanilla (on 360) but that was around the time the game released and I've been itching to get back into this. The leveling is my main issue with the game, so that'd be the first area I'd address... Beyond that I don't even know yet.
Fallout 3/New Vegas - I found this the other day, and there seems to be a lot of overlap, but looking back on it it's probably super out-of-date...
STALKER - I plan on playing all 3 with just the Complete mods. I tried playing SoC a loooong time ago with just the developer patches and it was... Unpleasant.
VTM: Bloodlines - I think I just want to use the fan-made mod here.

On this topic, I'm in the process of making the shift to PC. I'm going to sell my copy of New Vegas for 360 and get it on PC, so what mods are a must for NV? Are they as finished and polished as the many Fallout 3 mods, or would it be worth holding off a bit longer?

Pretty much the only time I would use a mod on a base game (as opposed to a full-fledged mod like Dear Esther or The Stanley Parable) is to fix something about usability, playability, cosmetics, or fun-factor that really irks me.

Man, I feel for you, sabrage. I modded Oblivion too much. I can't return it to that sweet spot so it's almost unplayable. Almost. And when I deleted my World of Warcraft install I basically signed a contract stating that I could never play it again. The work required to mod that sucker back to a playable state is easily two solid days of effort. Added on top of the changes that happen to it.

A potentially useful habit to get into is making a text document when you install a game and recording every tweak you make and how like a log. That way you can just follow the steps next time. If you keep the doc backed up ;)

On this topic, I'm in the process of making the shift to PC. I'm going to sell my copy of New Vegas for 360 and get it on PC, so what mods are a must for NV? Are they as finished and polished as the many Fallout 3 mods, or would it be worth holding off a bit longer?

Not as many mods out there for New Vegas yet, but Project Nevada though a work in progress is shaping up nicely. It has the usual new weapons and armour, along with visual overlays for things like goggles. A sprint mode and activatable bullet time are alternative ways to spend your AP if you don't like to rely on VATS too much and there's a hotkey for grenades. It also introduces an implants system that replaces the basic one in vanilla, where you have limited slots in which you can fit various augmentations (from stat boosts, to stealth modules via razor claws).

Perhaps the most important part of PN is the rebalance, it adusts damage so that everything is more lethal, slows down levelling and has options for things like food and drink requirements for people playing hardcore as well as making ammo and food harder to find. Best thing about the rebalance is all the variables are available for tweaking, so if you want to make it so all battles are extremely deadly and dangeorus and (both for you and npcs) you can.

(does anyone know how to get Wolfenstein 3D to use a "standard" KB+Mouse setup? I tried Wolf4SDL but I don't really know how it works)

I thought Wolf4SDL did that... but even then you'd probably just trigger mouse movement, where moving it forward moves you forward, since there's no look up/down in the Wolf3D games. Not sure why you'd bother to be honest?

I thought Wolf4SDL did that... but even then you'd probably just trigger mouse movement, where moving it forward moves you forward, since there's no look up/down in the Wolf3D games. Not sure why you'd bother to be honest?

If I can't strafe with A/D and holding alt triggers mouse movement, I honestly don't want to play it. It's not even a very interesting game compared to Doom, Quake, Heretic but my initial thought was that if I'm gonna play them all I might as well play them all. Now it just feels like more headaches than it's worth.

Kids these days. Play 'em like they were meant to be played, right hand on the arrow keys, left hand for CTRL, spacebar, tab, shift, etc. Pretending it's a modern FPS is very silly. They're action games with quasi-3D graphics.

It's just a mess of plugins. Any small addition may require half a dozen of 'dependency' plugins. Sometimes the dependencies aren't there, or have upgraded and changed name... It's nothing like just extracting the plugin to your plugin directory, it's just a bloody horrible nightmare.

But I really want to play SimCity4 again. I should have never uninstalled it.

Which is why I will never uninstall Oblivion. I have it how I want it, it took me far too long, and so it shall never be deleted form my hard drive.

I wouldn't mod New Vegas too much at all. With all games I tend to focus on small cosmetic tweaks.
For NV, i only have a UI mod that sorts the inventory, putting [part] or [aid] tags in front of items of the respective type.
Less Intrusive Kill Cam, Fellout, Nevada Skies, Perk Every Level, and of course the Fallout Stutter Remover. The terrible, terrible engine is incredibly in being able to have horrible fps drops on minimal settings due to being a shitty port.

And that's it. Played NV quite a lot with just a tiny ensemble of cosmetic mods.

It's just a mess of plugins. Any small addition may require half a dozen of 'dependency' plugins. Sometimes the dependencies aren't there, or have upgraded and changed name... It's nothing like just extracting the plugin to your plugin directory, it's just a bloody horrible nightmare.

But I really want to play SimCity4 again. I should have never uninstalled it.

This completely... I have a very complex region that I spend an awfully long time making, but I have been dreading getting it to run on my new PC. It may be impossible to get all the exact plugins.

Oblivion and FO3 really shine with a ton of mods that can correct/enhance a lot of flaws in the vanilla game to radical changes in almost every aspect. FONV's vanilla game with the DLC's though stands on it's own pretty well. My mod list has grown over the months as I've tried hundreds, but these are the ones that are always installed: